Acer Ferrari 1100, One Large Disappointment

PC Magazine was finally able to get ahold of an Acer Ferrari 1100 to review, and the results are less than stellar. With complaints about the 12-inch screen that isn't even LED-back-lit, a large clunky design, and underwhelming performance, it seems that the only redeeming feature is the integrated, slot-loading DVD burner. "The Acer Ferrari 1100 would be more attractive if its price ($1,860) wasn't higher than that of the more aesthetically pleasing Apple MacBook Air ($1,799) or the ASUS U6S ($1,699). For those who passed on the first-edition Ferrari ultraportable because it lacked an optical drive, the 1100 now has one built in. But in a world consumed by miniaturization, it will have to shave off a bit of weight and improve its performance scores for it to compete with thoroughbreds like the Sony SZ791N, the Dell XPS M1330, and the Lenovo X61."

Comments

Pffft....

[canUbeleiveIT]

it seems that the only redeeming feature is the integrated, slot-loading DVD burner.

My cheapie Gateway has that. I'm just sayin'...

Re:Pffft....

[EVil Lawyer]

But is your cheapie Gateway an ultraportable? The point is that slot-loading DVD burners are a rarity among the UMPC crowd.

Re:Pffft....

[v(*_*)vvvv]

Most new models have them, or have the option.

I find it rarer for a notebook the size (weight) of the mbAir not having a built-in drive.

12" screen?

[Loconut1389]

The last 12" screen I had was my Acer 486 notebook, and it was grayscale. Have they brought those back? And for $1,800+? No way! You can get half decent notebooks with 15.4" WXGA's for $800 these days, dvd burner to boot.

Re:12" screen?

[risinganger]

I'm writing this on a 12" iBook G4 which was only discontinued just over a year ago. While I've had laptops with larger screens I prefer the size/weight of this machine. I don't think you can call 15.4 a notebook by the way.

Re:12" screen?

[SlashdotOgre]

You're missing the point, the people looking for an ultraportable notebook wouldn't even consider a model with a 15.4" screen, heck 13" is pushing it. While of course you could find a 15.4" model from Dell (or just about any other vendor) for under a grand, you can be gauranteed those things will weigh at least over 5lbs. The ultraportable notebook market targets people who carry a notebook with them all day and don't want something that will weigh them down or be cumbersome to open. What they want/need is something that you won't even notice you're carrying, that can be opened on a plane even when the jerk in front of you is fully reclined, something with enough battery to get you through your last sales call.

I agree that $1800 is way too much to spend, but the fact of the matter is all the modern models that are under 3lbs cost around that range. Personally, when I needed a ultraportable, I bought a 2.6lb Portege 2000 for about $200 from eBay last year, and while it's by no means a powerful machine by today's standards, it has more than enough power for most people's ultraportable needs. It's a P3 750 w/ 256MB RAM, and it runs Fedora Core 6 with Fluxbox amazingly fast. The places I use this laptop, I wouldn't even consider bringing my 14.1" D610, and anything larger would be out of the question. At the same time, if I was doing CAD or art, or many other types of work, there'd be no point for a laptop this small or slow, and those larger models become really attractive.

Re:12" screen?

[Loconut1389]

I suppose I should have clarified my point- if you're getting less, why pay more? You did agree it was too much, so you indirectly caught my point anyway :)

Re:12" screen?

[mr_matticus]

He indicated it was too much for his taste, but he also fairly indicated that this is the market's price range all around. You might think that a Wusthof is an overpriced knife and Farberware gets the job done fine. That clearly doesn't mean that Wusthof should lower its prices.

Who says you're getting less? You'd have to be extremely one-dimensional to make that claim. A 50% weight reduction might easily be worth more than a 15" screen. A loss of 3/4" in thickness could very well make sense for a slower CPU and fewer ports. If you don't need or want something, it doesn't have any value to you.

You don't care about looks, size, or weight. So this isn't for you. A business traveler probably doesn't care about having a desktop on his shoulder. So your machine isn't for him. It's presumptuous to claim you're getting "less" in an ultraportable than in a flimsily built standard laptop.

Re:12" screen?

[Loconut1389]

I was generally under the impression, having dismantled a few laptops, that the bulk of the laptop was in the screen and the necessary supports (as well as most of the cost) and the battery and dvd drive- with the motherboard and memory taking up a pretty tiny percentage of the innards. It seems to me, getting a 12" screen would reduce much of the cost both in terms of necessary supports and cost of the screen itself. Put a smaller keyboard, and voila. The DVD drive you can't shrink much, so the rest relies on battery technology which should be the same as in every other laptop. Somehow $1800 for a laptop, which in a side-by-side comparison with others doesn't seem to me much more (if any) rugged or have any nifty features. Does it really cost an extra $1000 to put it in a smaller form factor? We're not talking teeny- just smaller? I'm truly looking for insight/details here, not asking questions I think I know the answers to. Any enlightenment would be great. Is this ferarri laptop more rugged, or in any way better than its larger brethren, size aside? The second part of the question is, does that size difference equal the price difference, less some leeway for the ferarri brand name/image?

Re:12" screen?

[mr_matticus]

Well this Ferrari seems a bit lazy, but as to other ultraportables: yes.

It is no small feat (no pun intended) to reduce these machines. Whether it's a $2100 Vaio or an $1800 MacBook Air, every millimeter is a fight. Take the MacBook. It's one of the world's thinnest notebooks to begin with--barely over an inch thick overall. It is completely maximized for space as to "standard" notebook components.

Then look at the MBA. It is the same machine, only less than half the volume. It's 0.3" thinner at its very thickest, and averages about half an inch thick throughout. How do you do that? What makes it so that you can package a thinner machine? Keep in mind that most notebooks are 1.5" thick, and a notebook is already a complex miniaturization of a desktop system. The low-travel keyboard alone takes up about a third of the thickest part of the MBA and about a quarter of the thickness of a Vaio. How do you manage heat distribution when there is so little room for air circulation? How do you move heat away from components horizontally because radiating upward won't actually allow heat to escape? How do you further miniaturize an already-tiny CPU package (for the MBA, it involved new packaging--smaller and more expensive for the same thing)? How do you cram a whole motherboard into a space smaller than your typical PCI sound card? How do you make a battery small enough to fit in that height but last long enough (for the MBA, it's to remove all the bulky packaging and the space-wasting bay and put it directly in the case--it's not the first company to do so)?

Every millimeter is a fight. Removing the optical drive gets you maybe 1/3 of the way there for the MacBook Air. The rest of that makes a difference. There are plenty of people who would take the extra fifth of an inch back so they could keep the DVD drive. Sony makes a great Vaio for that, but it costs at least as much as the Air.

Is it really an extra $1000? The answer to that question is the same as the answer to "why is the very fastest CPU $500 more than the next best, and beats it by maybe 5%?" Because that's why they call it the bleeding edge. Early adopters pay the premium that makes things happen. The trickle-down effect takes over from there.

Re:12" screen?

[exploder]

Which laptop is that? IMO 12" is a really sweet size for a laptop (I love my Dell XPS m1210), but I feel cramped at 1280x800.

Re:12" screen?

[that this is not und]

I may sound weird and reactionary, but if someone would come out with an ultraportable with a reflective grayscale LCD of reasonably high resolution, I bet there would be a ton of people who'd get it. It would result in a pretty incredible power savings.

Re:12" screen?

[moosesocks]

Who says you're getting less? You'd have to be extremely one-dimensional to make that claim. A 50% weight reduction might easily be worth more than a 15" screen. A loss of 3/4" in thickness could very well make sense for a slower CPU and fewer ports. If you don't need or want something, it doesn't have any value to you.

Yes, and no. What if you don't have to make major compromises for the advantage of portability?

Apple's last generation of PowerBooks were essentially identical across screen sizes. The 12" model had virtually all of the important features of the 15" model, and the 17" didn't add all that much of value (apart from the big screen). It was no surprise, that the 12" model was one of the most popular and highly-regarded machines that Apple ever produced. Fast processor (for the time it was produced), a full range of ports (2x Usb, Firewire, Display, Ethernet, Modem, Audio), DVD Burner, decent graphics processor, and literally everything else you'd expect to find in a high-end notebook.

I own one such machine, and although the small screen does get annoying at times, the increased portability makes it 100% worthwhile. I've got a nice big screen at home, and at work that I can use if I need to, although a 12" screen is perfectly adequate for what you'd want to use a laptop for anyhow...... Serious photoshop work and marathon coding sessions do benefit from a big screen, although most tasks are perfectly fine on a smaller screen.

Not that this is an advertisement for Apple in any way..... Their recent machines have been somewhat of a letdown. The MacBook made numerous sacrifices in the name of affordability, and actually *increased* the size of the machine (albeit in the name of re-scaling the screen to a more practical aspect ratio). The MacBook Air, on the other end of the spectrum, made far too many sacrifices in the name of portability, and also costs a bloody fortune given how crippled it is.

Nobody needs a 15"+ 5+ pound laptop. The benefits of a small machine vastly outweigh those of a large one, and it's not all that difficult to build a full-featured machine into a small chassis without making too many compromises.

Re:12" screen?

[mr_matticus]

it's not all that difficult to build a full-featured machine into a small chassis without making too many compromises. And Apple did just that with the MacBook, just as Dell has done with some of its XPS line, Sony, HP, and Lenovo have several of those as well. You're welcome to buy one of those, but to suggest that it's adequate for everyone is simply not the case. A five-pound MacBook isn't what everyone wants.

None of them are ultraportables, though.

Again, you're presumptively mocking the situations where thin and light matters more than it does to you. Two and a half pounds doesn't sound like a lot to you, but it's a 45% weight reduction. A minimum 0.3" thickness reduction doesn't mean much to you, but it packs essentially the same machine into half the volume. These things aren't worth another $700 to you the same way one of those monstrous 17" Dell laptops with two hard drives and desktop CPUs aren't worth another $1000 to you. To speak about footprint is again to miss the critical point--all folios and briefcases will accommodate a notebook--the footprint is similar to a sheet of paper. It's thickness and weight that they compete on.

If you want something with a smaller, more PDA-like footprint, you're also shopping in the wrong segment, though plenty of companies offer that, too. The OQO products are excellent examples of subnotebooks(note their price: ~$1800; you get "even less" than a MacBook Air).

Re:12" screen?

[bitmonk]

Ack! Dear fellow 12" PowerBook owner, please abridge! The Air is perfect for us. Do not forget the heat issues of that machine, at least if you ran the last generation of it at 1.5Ghz - Apple discontinued it for this reason and is only exploring this territory again thanks to smaller die.

The Air plugs into a big screen, supports USB which was *designed* to expand via a hub, because the number-of-ports problem is a dead, beaten horse from the 80s and 90s. You can get a really decent looking 4-port hub on Amazon for $25 which is about the size of an index finger. From a practicality perspective, I'd rather have all my devices stay plugged into the hub, and just have one plug to plug when I come home to my desk. Don't forget that USB hubs are designed to chain, as well, up to 128 or 256, if not further, IIRC.

The only practical use for FW is video, which yes, you should have a 15 or 17" Pro for if you want to do field editing. You also shouldn't be complaining about Price if you have a RED cam. Unless you put a 15krpm drive in a FW case, you'll have a lot of trouble telling the difference between it and USB - I have two of the same model drive from the same manufacturer, and benchmarked them pretty close, to my dismay. The iPod can't connect to FireWire for years now, sadly.

Maybe by 'crippled' you're talking about the optical drive, or the graphics chip - fair enough, but don't forget that if you're talking ultraportable, it offers an SSD which I look forward to strapping to my back while sprinting around downtown - some people call this sort of swap-out-craziness a 'tradeoff'. The external optical drive is a godsend, IMO, because taking your slot-loading optical drive around with you everywhere as part of the main computer is an invitation for street dust to enter your machine and esp to haze up your optical lens.

As for Graphics, eh, I ran a major graphics community website for a good couple of years and was many times talked down from the belief that I couldn't use a 13" MacBook for serious graphics work - though of course it's bound to be limited. There's no reason that the Air should be considered "crippled" on this point.

C'mon, give up some love for the Air. Compared to the 12" PB, this thing is cooler, faster, smaller, has two cores, more RAM, motha fricking flash storage, an LED backlit screen and boasts five hours of battery life, though of course, that depends largely on the software you run and whether you can type fast enough to recharge it a little. ;)

currently hearing in my head: harder, better, faster, stronger
http://youtube.com/watch?v=Sr2JneittqQ

Apple should change their slogan to "Our.Work.is.Never.Over."

Re:12" screen?

[moosesocks]

I don't want to turn this into an argument, because the Air is a nice machine, although it fills a distinctly different niche from the 12" Powerbook.

The Air is *strictly* a machine to be used either as a "second" computer, or to be plugged into a permanent workstation with a mouse, external storage, etc...

The dual cores, LED screen, etc are all technological improvements that could have just as easily been added to any other machine.

The lack of wired ethernet is a massive drawback. Wireless isn't everywhere, and 802.11n is even rarer. Dongles = Evil.

*One* USB port is rather weak, especially if you're going to be needing a USB->Ethernet dongle. (This is perhaps the Air's greatest crime)

The SSD is nice, but at $1000, is also vastly overpriced. The 4200 RPM hard drive offered as an alternate is, to be frank, pathetic.

I never *plan* on using a 12" laptop to do massive video editing projects, nor do I use the optical drive all that frequently. However, it is nice to know that I'm equipped to do both, should the need arise (which it has, and on more than a few occasions!)

5 hour battery life isn't particularly impressive, especially if there's an SSD involved. A 12" powerbook can be squeezed to about 4.5 hours with a new battery and the screen brightness turned down.

All in all, I'm going to have to pass on the Air. I suppose that when this machine finally kicks the bucket in a few years time, I'll reluctantly move to a MacBook.

Re:12" screen?

[bitmonk]

Yeah I don't really want to sell you on the Air, I just think it deserves more props. If you enjoy having an optical drive with you everywhere, yanno, that's great. My optical drive is a redheaded stepchild that rarely works, and that has been the case for three portables. I don't think I would go to a plastic case to gain mobility - I dropped my 12" PowerBook once from within a backpack, while walking, it bounced on the pavement, and continued working for months until someone sat on the screen while it was open. Those plastic cases crack, the power supply breaks, and really, you don't ever want to use that computer again.

If you price the SSD as a retail purchase, you will see that Apple is actually getting a really good deal on them, afaict.

As far as lack of wired ethernet, again, you don't take the ethernet cord with you - if you have a usb drive, ethernet, etc.. at each desk, it's much quicker to plug them all in at once using a $25 USB hub. Leave the dongle on the cable - I used to have a spare AC adapter which I left at work, and one I kept at home, just so I wouldn't have to fumble with them all the time. Now, of course, I just yank on the cord to get it from my loft bed down to the shelf on my desk.

Keep in mind that Dongle will probably work with any computer you can throw at it, for years. It's not like a dongle that goes with a pmcia card, it's the whole thing. Plug it into a Dell running GNU/Linux, five bucks says it'll work.

I will say that I'd like the option to bring a spare battery, but the size - the size! My main concern is that the battery degrades over time and I tend just to replace them. This could be a great excuse to have Apple upgrade your entire machine and sell the old as refurb, who knows. Mac Genii have told me many times that they feel a customer's experience will be degraded on any machine - portables, at least - that is ever opened after it leaves the factory.

It would be great to see a smaller MacBook Pro, something more like that 12" which has a bit of thickness to it, and maybe now thanks to Penryn, can tolerate some added heat from a GPU. Maybe giving the Air a GPU would even tip the scales for me, but expandable ram, swappable battery, and higher proc speeds in a thicker, but still backpack-sized package sound like they would please you.

If you aren't trying to fit this into a small backpack or something, get a 15", seriously. I want the Air for on campus because I can't carry my 15" along with several 13" books unless I bring a monstrous bag.

I'm dissappointed to see the press quoting the Mac crowd as hating the Air, because I've been running my MBP ragged trying to earn money to buy one, and it would be very sad if Apple decided to stop selling them before I could. It's clear, however, that Apple needs to look at you.

Frankly, I do plan to replace my MBP, as I have a nice 17" SGI 1600SW DFP on my desk, apple's new wireless keyboard, and with the SSD I expect a 1.6 or 1.8 speed Air to compete with my two year old 1.83 MBP, esp when dealing with virtual machines and the like.

I don't know that I'll buy another Pro until they go Quadra, which of course maybe is the new pie-in-the-sky like a G5 PB. One day someone will consider the CPU Whine in my first-gen to make it a collector's item, but I promised Chuck Csuri when he signed it that I wouldn't sell it.

Re:12" screen?

[bitmonk]

Ah, also want to comment on the 4200 PATA option, yes that is lame. I believe this is a smaller-than-normal form factor, and also I feel this was designed with the SSD in mind, and that someone in Marketing said: Give me a $2k option and we'll move forward. A Middleground would be nice, but check this article:

    http://www.macrumors.com/2008/01/30/maximum-macbook-air-drive-80gb-for-now/

Apparently, that 80G 4200rpm drive is also a single platter, which might affect its' performance *positively*. No other drive can fit in the space of the SSD. So, maybe I'm wrong, and they thought of this - I imagine the SSD and HD manufacturers more or less know who they are competing with in that space, and that their products will have to fit in the same design as each other.

With education discount, I've got a nice model priced at $2909 with 1.6Ghz, SSD, SuperDrive, Ethernet, and AppleCare. I spent about this much on my 12" MBP and don't recall heavily using any features it had that this won't. I also think that the external drive will be nice because it might be possible to *type* while burning, which is a real problem using a portable with integrated burner as main computer.

Ok, this line says it all

[jollyreaper]

The Ferrari series is the only one of Acer's laptop lines that favors design over price and performance. If I'm dropping $1800 on a laptop, I'm expecting design AND performance at the expense of affordability. For that kind of money, why not get a Mac? Sheesh! A fool and his money are some party.

Re:Ok, this line says it all

[jollyreaper]

If I'm dropping $1800 on a laptop, I'm expecting design AND performance at the expense of affordability. Um. $1800 isn't worth what it once was. $1800 may not buy as much as it used to but it takes just as long to earn it. Hell, for the people who have been laid off and are working shit jobs, it takes even longer to earn it than before.

Re:Ok, this line says it all

[68K]

'Some party'? The phrase you're looking for is 'a fool and his money are SOON PARTED.'

Re:Ok, this line says it all

[mdwh2]

If I'm dropping $1800 on a laptop, I'm expecting design AND performance at the expense of affordability. For that kind of money, why not get a Mac?

Or the Asus or Sony. Acer aren't the only maker of PC laptops.

Re:Ok, this line says it all

[BuhDuh]

OK, let's compare the feature set:
The Acer: 2.3GHz AMD Turion 64 X2 TL-66 The Apple: 1.8GHz Intel Core2 Duo
The Acer: 4GB DDR2 The Apple: 2GB DDR2
The Acer: 250GB Hard Drive The Apple: 64GB SSD
The Acer: DVD Super Multi The Apple: None
Seems to me it's not bad what you can get for an extra $100 or so.

Re:Ok, this line says it all

[Anonymous Coward]

I'm not dropping $1,800 on a laptop even if it performs oral sex whilst singing "Bohemian Rhapsody", balancing my checkbook, finding me a better job, changing diapers, and ensuring the tax thugs don't know about my dolphin smuggling.

Re:Ok, this line says it all

[jandrese]

$1800 really isn't all that much for a laptop. While the low end ones are reasonably cheap, once you get fancy the price shoots up amazingly fast. Even boring old Dell laptops get well over that.

Re:Ok, this line says it all

[hairyfeet]

Actually,I have never had an Apple,being on Windows since Win95,and only recently switching to Linux on my laptop.I was simply stating something that is obvious to anyone,which is even older Apple computers sell for a LOT more than the equivalent Windows machine.

I have also worked in many repair shops over the years and the only brand brought into the shop for repairs more than Acer was Emachine. I don't know if it was a QA issue,or if they simply had a few bad runs,like Dell with the caps,but I've had to deal with Acer computers with all kinds of problems-integrated video failures,hdd,ram,blown psu,etc.Based on my experience in the shops I wouldn't touch either an Acer or an Emachine,period.

But you can sream "fanboy" all you want,just go to eBay and use your own two eyes.Five and six year old Apple laptops still sell for a pretty penny while the same age Windows laptops are dirt cheap.Of course if you wanted a quality Windows laptop I would suggest a thinkpad or toughbook.Those still sell for a good price after 5 years and with good reason-they are built like tanks.But hey,believe what you want-but if you get more than $200 for a five year old acer I'll be amazed.I just looked on eBay and the three year old ones are starting less than $100.But as always my 02c from years of working on the things,YMMV.

Re:Ok, this line says it all

[BuhDuh]

Yes, and in 5 years time we'll all go rushing to eBay to snap up these 'bargains' - ancient technology - when we can get a system 4 times more powerful at 1/3 of the cost?

Re:Ok, this line says it all

[jollyreaper]

'Some party'? The phrase you're looking for is 'a fool and his money are SOON PARTED.' The trick is to find the right fool when he's buying rounds. :)

Re:Ok, this line says it all

[hairyfeet]

That is true,but the post was about some troll calling me fanboi was simply stating that an $1800 Apple has a better ROI than an $1800 Acer,which I believe I have made clear is a matter of common sense.And when it comes to Apple I wouldn't knock the five year olds so easily.I have a school bud who has a five year old macbook running 10.4,and in a side by side with my (at the time) barely six month old Dell,he was running circles around me.And I have met some in the net intrusion community that swear by the PPC,and won't be switching to Intel for a good long while.And with the speed and ease of use they were getting out of their PPC macs,I really can't blame them. But while I think Apple has a better ROI in the high dollar market,I simply can see myself spending that kind of money on a laptop when my two year old Dell running Xandros Business runs fast and rock solid stable.But as always,my 02c,YMMV

Re:Ok, this line says it all

[MobileTatsu-NJG]

"'Some party'? The phrase you're looking for is 'a fool and his money are SOON PARTED.'"

I think he was going with the Australian variant of the phrase.

I never got the ferrari

[jawtheshark]

Why in hell would one want to have a laptop that is branded after a car? I don't see the point... I wouldn't want to buy a Porsche, BMW, Mercedes or Audi branded laptop either.

Re:I never got the ferrari

[jo42]

...sheepishly puts away his Ferrari coffee cup, Ferrari mouse pad, Ferrari poker cards and Mercedes Benz umbrella... :-p

Re:I never got the ferrari

[OakLEE]

Or a better question, why would Ferrari license their trademark out to be slapped on something that any reasonable person could tell is a piece of crap just by looking at it. Seriously who needs a VGA, and a PS/2 port on their laptop nowadays? What year is this, 1998? And for $1860? Unless you really need the dedicated video to play games on a 12" screen, I don't see much reason to buy this one.

As for the case. Who needs carbon fiber on their laptop? Its use obviously didn't save any weight. The case weighs 4.4 lbs. You can also tell it uses cheap plastic that will discolor or crack easily. If I'm paying $1900 for a laptop, it better at least look and feel like a $1900 laptop (see a Lenovo Thinkpad or MacBook Pro). Ferrari has come a long way since the days when they were associated with flashy but brittle cars. I don't think it's in their best interest to rekindle that memory by putting their name on flashy yet brittle laptops.

Re:I never got the ferrari

[Loconut1389]

Lots of people like to dock at work and only use the (exceptionally small) screen on the road. Unless there's a dedicated all-in-one docking connector, VGA is important.

Re:I never got the ferrari

[FudRucker]

waiting for an Acer Volkswagen bug...

Re:I never got the ferrari

[seanmeister]

"FERRARI: From Envy, Retarted Redesigns Are Recycled Idiocies.

Welcome to our new, improved "Car names and what they really mean" game.

From the makers of the new improved "Humorously coincidental mis-spelling" game!

Re:I never got the ferrari

[Jesus_666]

Or you just do like Apple does and ship a DVI-to-VGA adapter.

Re:I never got the ferrari

[vux984]

Seriously who needs a VGA, [...] port on their laptop nowadays?

Most people?

Connecting to large screens or projectors is a pretty common use for laptops.

Sure from a technical standpoint, I'd prefer DVI, with adapters to VGA, but VGA is probably more convenient. Most projectors I encounter are still VGA, as are a lot of budget screens, and the expensive ones at least support VGA too.

So for an ultra portable do I want the technically better DVI and the hassle of adapters everywhere I go... or just put up with the the lower quality of VGA but at least it works everywehre without carrying additional bits everywhere I go?

Tough call. I can see the argument for VGA.

Re:I never got the ferrari

[elguap0]

That's not a PS/2 port judging by the pinout... it's probably for TV output. You might say a DVI port would be better than VGA, but then you run into the problem of not having the adapter handy when you want to connect to a projector in a conference room (I'm guessing that's one of the popular uses of VGA ports on laptops) As for carbon fiber, it's a ferrari branded laptop, what do you expect? It needs to tie in to the automobile brand somehow.

Re:I never got the ferrari

[mdwh2]

But, but ... I'd rather have something that I can just plug straight in - that Just Works.

Re:I never got the ferrari

[Scooter]

why would Ferrari license their trademark out to be slapped on something that any reasonable person could tell is a piece of crap just by looking at it.

Because - it pays. Ferrari will stick their label on any piece of crud going if it will make them a buck. I had a look round the "Ferrari Store" in Rome last week and was amazed at the tat on offer with a Ferrari badge on it. A cheapo Olympus compact digital camera for example - normally retails at £100, but produced in red with Ferrari badge - 895 euro (about £700). They definitely "saw you coming". http://www.isawyoucoming.org/

Re:I never got the ferrari

[hjf]

I really don't know why people like the GP care to post. They seem to think that when there's a new technology, the whole world just ditches all their old stuff and replaces it with whatever is new. Seriously... how many DVI projectors are out there? In my university, they're all VGA, and they work fine. No need to replace it with DVI just because it's new.

Also, if it has a DVI out, you need to make sure it's a DVI-I output (good luck finding that by other than testing it), and you need to carry your adaptor around. With VGA, there's always a VGA input and a VGA cable that you can borrow if needed.

Re:I never got the ferrari

[OakLEE]

I should have been clearer in saying DVI over VGA but you made my point, so thank you.

My big gripe is that for $1900 bucks it should come with a DVI Input. Sure we're still in a VGA populated world now, but what about in 3-4 years when DVI projectors become the norm? You'll need an adapter then, and then your video output is going to look horribly inferior to native DVI outputs.

Incidentally, for $2k I would expect a laptop to remain usable for 3-4 years, which is why I'm using that time frame. If its not going to last that long then why not buy a cheaper laptop now and upgrade in two years?

Re:I never got the ferrari

[speeDDemon (nw)]

Its easy to identify DVI-I vs DVI-D, the difference is quite apparent if your observant (oh, and have bothered to read a little about the technology)

Re:I never got the ferrari

[Jesus_666]

So a simple mechanical adaptor that goes between the cable and the notebook is unacceptable? For how long are notebooks supposed to support old standards? The VGA connector is becoming more and more rare with most people switching to flatscreen monitors and it takes up real estate that can be used to house additional ports (in fact, the MBP would have to either sacrifice the ExpressCard slot or change the entire hinge and become at least one centimeter taller in order to be able to house that port). I think having an adaptor that doesn't even consist of anything besides two conectors and wiring is quite reasonable, especially when you get it for free with every notebook.

One could also lament that many notebooks don't directly support PS/2 mice. There is, however, a simple adaptor that is very robust and easy to use and doesn't require any special software. Everyone wins - the notebook manufacturers don't have to use real estate to support an old interface and the users can still use PS/2 mice if they want to. Unlike DVI-to-VGA adaptor, this one usually comes bundled with newer PS/2 mice because the mouse manufacturers have accepted that the PS/2 interface standard is mostly obsolete.

Re:I never got the ferrari

[mdwh2]

I don't think not having them is that much of a problem, but I don't see how it actually makes things worse ("a piece of crap" the OP said). I don't have VGA on my laptop which isn't a problem - but the fact that it does have a PS/2 slot also isn't a problem.

And I was just parodying the way that whenever Macs have something done slightly simpler or as standard, even if you can do the same thing on a PC, the Mac's claimed to be better by chanting "It Just Works(TM)!" Strangely this doesn't apply when the situation is reversed.

Re:I never got the ferrari

[PureCreditor]

i thought that's a S-Video port, not a PS/2 ?

Re:I never got the ferrari

[level_headed_midwest]

Oh, you mean that adapter/dongle that almost everybody that has a Macintosh laptop and needs to hook it up to a projector forgets to bring, completely wrecking the presentation or lecture they were supposed to give.

Re:I never got the ferrari

[Jesus_666]

If you mean the MacBook Air that's so simple you can't even use Ethernet and watch a DVD at the same time without using a USB hub - yes, that doesn't really work. But then again the MBA is an exec toy and the target demographic has no qualms paying top money for a device that's not really useful.

As for VGA ports: Having them can make things worse - like I said, the 15" MBP was designed to be relatively small and thus doesn't have much room for connectors. Every bit of space that desn't already house some port has either the hard drive or the optical drive behind it or is part of the hinge. Additional ports would've been nice, but Apple preferred a small frame. Whether or not that makes sense to you is your problem - in an industrial environment where you need a serial port an Apple is out of the question while a student might prefer having a less full backpack over being able to easily interface with JTAG ports.


By the way, I chant the holy It Just Works Mantra only if things really just work. WLAN Just Works on my MBP, while attaching an external HDD that insists on using two USB ports doesn't - the USB ports are on opposing sides of the notebook and most USB Y cables aren't long enough to reach around it. Apple's not magically better, but hardware-wise they usually make pretty solid decisions, their use of Sony batteries nonwithstanding.

Re:I never got the ferrari

[Jesus_666]

There's a nice invention called a pocket. My backpack has one; I tend to store stuff like adapters and the remote in there so I don't even have to remember bringing them. Bad preparation is not a neccessary requirement for being an Apple user; a basic sense of style and a smug feeling of superiority are the only ones.

Re:I never got the ferrari

[hjf]

oh yes. you have to be observant http://www.hometheaterhifi.com/qa/images/dvi-jack-configuration.jpg ...

Well...

[Tpl2000]

1st, people would buy it just because the Ferrari is a cool car. 2nd, how much do you want to bet Acer profited anyway? The unexperienced will occasionally buy something because of a price tag, as opposed to numbers that they don't understand...

Far from a disappointment

[cyofee]

The people buying it will get everything they wanted - a laptop you can edit text and sufr the internet on, with a Ferrari logo.

Re:Far from a disappointment

[jfim]

The people buying it will get everything they wanted - a laptop you can edit text and sufr the internet on, with a Ferrari logo. Exactly. A lot of average people don't check specs(or do a poor job at it) and rather rely on aesthetics/salesmen recommendations to guide their choice. If I were to be a Ferrari fanatic, maybe I'd buy it because of the brand attachment, as crazy as it may sound. On the other hand, some people only look at the specs and don't care if their PC is only parts in a cardboard box.

Re:Far from a disappointment

[McNally]

a laptop you can edit text and sufr the internet on

What a great transposition.. On some machines you "surf", but cut a few too many corners and you "sufr"..

The design...

[KDEWolf]

...simply sucks. I don't understand what that little horse is doing standing there, really... And with such price tag.

Re: Lenovo X61 HAHAHAHA

[PFAK]

Troll.

The X61 has excellent reviews, infact I own one myself. Under "light" use (and I'm sure that Excel falls under light use), I can get 7 hours out of the battery with wireless enabled, if I'm watching XViD with VLC I can get about 4 hours out of the battery.

The hard disk is not slow at all, I'm running Windows XP and boot time is under a minute on the machine and is sufficient for most tasks.

Jeez...

[yourexhalekiss]

This laptop seems like a real loser. I had a different product with far better features way back this summer, for $600 less: the Dell XPS m1330. Slot-loading DVD burner, discrete graphics card, backlit LCD screen, etc. Dell even sells it w/ Linux. The only "bad" things about it in relation to this laptop is that it has a 13 inch screen instead of a 12", and it weighs about 3.8 pounds. (Still very light.)

Battery life on it is great, too: 4 hours of normal "note-taking" use (I'm in school) with the 6 cell battery, and a full six hours of regular use with the nine cell.

Frankly, I don't see why the slod-loading DVD burner is such a big deal: it's been done better and cheaper before.

Re:Jeez...

[Shemmie]

I'll second that. My M1330 is a couple of months old, and it's a beauty. 2 gig RAM, 2.2 GHz Core 2 Duo, the 9 cell option (it runs and runs, even Bluetoothing to my phone for net access), Geforce 8400, LED back-lit, and 320 gig HD. I look at the specs on the Ferrari and cringe, to be honest. The only thing I could complain about with my laptop is that the black top attracts fingerprints and smudges like a finger-print magnet.

When that's the biggest complaint, you know it's a good system.

Re: Lenovo X61 HAHAHAHA

[ElPresPufferfish]

Do you have the extended battery?

Under normal use with firefox/pidgin/xchat I only get about 4 hours of it.
I did opt for a 7200RPM hard drive, but I doubt that makes that much of a difference..

Re: Lenovo X61 HAHAHAHA

[PFAK]

Yes, I have the extended battery. Note that: Lenovo doesn't even support Linux on that hardware, so your mileage will vary.

Re:at least it has a real video card unlike the $1

[ncryptd]

I'm not a fan of the MacBook Air -- but in all honesty, how many times have you been using a subportable only to think "Hmm... if only this thing had a better fill rate." The onboard chip supports PS 2.0, albeit slowly -- it's only a performance limitation, not a restriction on functionality.

VGA for projectors, and it's not a PS/2 Port

[langelgjm]

Seriously who needs a VGA, and a PS/2 port on their laptop nowadays?

Lots of people need VGA out to hook up to projectors. Also, that's not a PS/2 port. Judging by the pin configuration, I'm guessing it's an S-Video out or something, for attaching to TVs, etc.

Re:VGA for projectors, and it's not a PS/2 Port

[colinrichardday]

Hey, the screen on my laptop would go out (laptop still running, just couldn't see the display). I was able to see it by plugging in a monitor to the VGA port.

Re:VGA for projectors, and it's not a PS/2 Port

[TheRaven64]

Modern projectors use DVI. Older ones can be used via a DVI to VGA adaptor. Having a VGA port on a laptop seems archaic - my last two haven't had one and I give presentations fairly often.

Re:VGA for projectors, and it's not a PS/2 Port

[Splab]

Jup thats a S-VHS port.

And to GP; having VGA out seems to be smarter than DVI, most projectors and screens that support DVI has a VGA input also, so going with VGA should target a broader audience.

Re:VGA for projectors, and it's not a PS/2 Port

[Anubis350]

A $2 adapter turns the dvi port on my macbook pro into a vga port, and still gives me the digital when I need it. Not including digital on an 1800 dollar laptop is a bit ridiculous these days, particularly since we're starting to get projectors using digital inputs. I can use both on my laptop, this new acer certainly can't.

Re:VGA for projectors, and it's not a PS/2 Port

[Briareos]

having VGA out seems to be smarter than DVI, most projectors and screens that support DVI has a VGA input also, so going with VGA should target a broader audience. There's this thing called a DVI-I connector that gives you both, so why cripple anything with an analog-out-only port these days?

np: The Orb - DDD (Dirty Disco Dub) (The Dream)

Ferrari 4000

[KingJ]

I own a Ferrari 4000 laptop, it's two years old and I still use it on a daily basis. I didn't buy it for it's branding, and I would rather not have the branding however at the time it was one of the few laptops with a real graphics card in it (no intel rubbish!). I want to be able to play games while not at home, anywhere. It's a very durable laptop that has survived many drops and the slot-load CD drive is an excellent idea - I don't know why more laptops don't have them. The only thing i've had to replace during it's intensive life is the hard drive, not exactly Acer's fault.

Next time I buy a laptop, i'm looking at another Ferrari or a machine with a real graphics card at an affordable price. So far the only contender i've seen is Dell's Vostro, but I have a deep dislike of Dell due to previous experiences. I don't expect to be looking for another laptop for a while though while this one is still going strong.

Re:Ferrari 4000

[ScrewMaster]

I don't expect to be looking for another laptop for a while though while this one is still going strong.

Good job. You just jinxed yourself.

Re:Ferrari 4000

[ivan256]

I have a Ferrari 3400 that I bought for the same reason.

Unfortunately, the backlight doesn't come on unless I use the driver supplied by Acer, and they haven't updated it since the subsequent model came out. So I have a decent graphics chip and crappy old drivers. Thanks Acer!

(The machine is great otherwise; at least once the "car starting" noise is turned off at bootup... Durable, cool to the touch, slot loading, thin, light...)

Re:Ferrari 4000

[CompMD]

I have always liked Acer laptops, I had a Travelmate C303xmi convertible, and I miss it. At work we have Dell machines, and the senior engineer laptops we have now are Precision M90s. I'm not a huge Dell fan, but they are cheap and they do their job. I was actually impressed with the first M90 we got. It has a Quadro FX graphics card with dedicated memory which is fantastic for doing CAD work. Siemens NX and CATIA work flawlessly. I was happy to see that the M90 had three buttons on the trackpad as well. The M90 is big, but tough and powerful. It complements the Precision 670, 650, and 530 workstations we have very nicely.

look at the bright side

[FudRucker]

in a couple of years you will be able to pick up used acer ferreris and the asus eeepc and other similar mini lappys for about 50 bucks in about any pawn shop...

indeed, it's worth more

[Trepidity]

When it comes to computers, there's quite fast deflation. You can buy a lot more computing for $1800 today than in the past. More importantly, you can get a lot of good machines for a lot less than $1800, and an $1800 laptop is in the upper portion of the price range for mainstream machines---so needs to compete against other things in that price range, like Apple's higher-end products.

Re:at least it has a real video card unlike the $1

[TeknoHog]

Yeah, I can't imagine why anyone would like integrated Intel graphics that have full opensource drivers available in your friendly neighbourhood distro.

Re:This shouldn't be at all surprising

[Grimbleton]

I have a cheap Acer WalMart special that has never given me a second of grief, and I've had it over a year now.

Acers decline

[fartrader]

I blame it on Schumacher's retirement.

Re:at least it has a real video card unlike the $1

[beelsebob]

$1500? The MacBook costs $1099.

Re:Favors design?

[Riquez]

I totally agree, it's a monstrosity. "Favours Design over price"? What a joke, there's literally no aesthetic design to it at all. How disappointing to get that out of the box?, it looks 5 years old when new.

Re:at least it has a real video card unlike the $1

[mr_matticus]

Yeah, because that's exactly what you want on an ultraportable: a hot, battery-sucking video card so you can game on a 10-13" screen, packed in with a low-clocked, low voltage CPU. An ultraportable is not a desktop replacement. If you need a CAD workstation on the go, you're shopping in the wrong market segment. Who on earth modded this insightful?

For a group of people supposedly more "in the know" about technology than most, you seem to miss the point at a frightening frequency. Your 4GB, 2.6GHz dual-core CPU laptop with a 300GB hard drive and a 17" screen might be exactly what you want: maximum raw power. It's not what everyone else wants, and it's not what the lower 80% of computer users would ever come close to needing. Some people would rather spend that money on other things: size, aesthetics, convenience, true portability. Ultraportables under an inch thick are slim enough to fit in soft folios that are half the thickness of a laptop bag. Thin has its place. Specs are not king.

PS- the MacBook is $1100, not $1500, and it's also not a desktop replacement.

Re: On the other hand...

[Planky]

...the Dell M1330 is a great laptop.

The battery lasts 3.5 hours on power saver with wifi on, 2.5 when playing DVDs. It comes with an Geforce 8600, which makes for a good gaming machine. Dell were even kind enough to not bundle software on it or the restore disc (if you ignore Vista and the lack of XP drivers). The design is great - lightweight and aesthetically pleasing.

What makes it even better, is Ubuntu works without too much trouble - the only issue that I've encountered is the Wireless doesn't always start up after coming out of sleep mode

There are a few annoying issues with it, like the lack of proper nvidia/sound drivers for Windows XP, the DirectMedia app (which tends to wipe the hdd partitions without warning) and, of course, Windows Vista...

Re:at least it has a real video card unlike the $1

[Jeremy Erwin]

PS 2.0?

Excuse me, but on MacOSX, we use openGL and fragment shaders. None of this DirectX stuff, thankyouverymuch.

Re:This shouldn't be at all surprising

[Jeremy Erwin]

Really, not even backlit, that sounds like a really expensive paperweight to me.

It's not backlit by an LED, but there probably is a florescent bulb behind the screen

Unsurprising...

[Aardpig]

...I've had experience with two Acer laptops, and in both cases I've been very disappointed. Certainly, they're very cheap, but you don't get anything more than you pay for. The build quality is very low -- hold up the laptop by one corner, and the whole thing flexes and creaks. Not a lot of thought has gone into important issues such as thermal and noise management, and I wouldn't recommend them to anyone.

As others have already remarked, it's unclear why a company with a strong brand like Ferrari would chose to pair with such a weak manufacturer. IMHO, Ferrari can only lose by association with such a poor-quality product.

Re:Unsurprising...

[gnufied]

True Mate. I bought Acer Travelmate laptop about one and half year ago with prize money that I won in one of the open source programming scholarship ( I was an engineering student those days and in India I paid around 50,000 rupees or around 1200 dollors ). It was such an awful thing, I had to take it to their service center regularly ( rest of the gripping story can be read here ). About 4 to 5 months ago it died. Their service was worst and laptop was one odd junk ( so much for my first laptop ). Just avoid Acer laptops please.

Re:at least it has a real video card unlike the $1

[mdwh2]

True - although note that the Sony and Asus have the NVIDIA 8400M GS, which according to the benchmarks in the article do even better.

Re:at least it has a real video card unlike the $1

[mdwh2]

Actually the ATI x1270 is a piece of crap and I wouldn't be surprised of the Intel x3100 performed as just as well or possibly better.

The X3100 couldn't even run any of gaming benchmarks in the tests...

It doesn't really matter, you won't be playing games on any of those systems. Even the Nvidia 8400M would have a hard time running most games made within the past few years very well.

That misses the point - yes, they won't play the latest high-performance FPS games and so on, but people might still like to play older games (e.g., I only have the GMA 950 in my laptop, but I can still play a game like Morrowind - however, it runs better with a faster graphics card).

Re:This shouldn't be at all surprising

[Anonymous Coward]

can barely pass the warranty without passing a couple of times through their repairmen. Eww... do you mean they swallowed it? I wouldn't have thought the second repairman would go anywhere near it after it had "passed through" the first. :-6

Anyway, all this business of "spewing out" and "passing" computers makes Acer sound more like the successor to Tubgirl or something.

Re:at least it has a real video card unlike the $1

[EdIII]

They REALLY do miss your point at frightening frequencies. I NEED an ultraportable. Let me rephrase that. I fucking NEEEEED an ultraportable real fucking bad. Excuse my language :)

I have had PDA phones for years, since it combined the 2 things I need most. 1) A Cell Phone, 2) An organizer and limited ability to run code and surf web pages.

I recently canceled my data plan since I have been 4 different PDA models, and I have come to the inescapable conclusion that they all SUCK. The interface is not what I need, I cannot run everything I need from Windows Mobile 5, or 6. Windows Mobile is buggy as hell. Always has been. A PDA Phone just does not get the job done, and it has not gotten any better in 4 years.

So your point is dead on. I need an ultraportable that has just enough specs to get my job done, while being able to fit into an pocket. I don't need to run Crysis on it, or even it have it replace all the abilities of my high end workstations. I just need to be able to have a full OS, like Windows XP Professional. That will allow me to run the exact same programs that I have developed on my workstations. I need this for work, not play. If I wanted to play remotely, I would use my PSP or DS.

I don't need all the "raw power". I just need the ability to manage my networks, run some web pages, access some databases remotely. That's it.

Re: Lenovo X61 HAHAHAHA

[Anonymous Coward]

Informative? Who did that? My X61 has a 7200rpm drive (last time I checked it was not slow) and my 4-cell (that doesn't stick out the back) lasts me 4-4.5 hours on average.

Mod THAT as informative!

Re: Lenovo X61 HAHAHAHA

[SHaFT7]

the harddrive makes a huge difference in battery life. i had an HP laptop a few years back, and i went from 4200rpm to 7200rpm. it was super fast, but my battery life went from 2-2.25hrs to 45min.

Re:at least it has a real video card unlike the $1

[MsGeek]

I don't need all the "raw power". I just need the ability to manage my networks, run some web pages, access some databases remotely. That's it.

This looks like a job for Eee.

Re:at least it has a real video card unlike the $1

[CastrTroy]

I got an Acer 3680 laptop for $500 last September. Quite a low end machine, but that's what I was looking for. It has Intel integerated graphics and works great with Compiz and Metisse. Much easier to get working than most other video cards in Linux.

Re:This shouldn't be at all surprising

[CastrTroy]

I've had my Walmart Special Acer since September. Never had a problem with it. Probably one of the better laptops you could get for $500. Granted, if you run the stock Windows Vista that comes with it, it's slow as molasses in January, but if if you pop a nice Linux distro on it (Mandrive in my case) it becomes quite a good machine.

Re:This shouldn't be at all surprising

[mikael]

That happens with my laptop (Sony Vaio) - for some time I had this battle where the system would state that the power cable had been disconnected and it was switching to battery power (even thought it was still plugged in). I would end up having the system remaining off for the entire evening. This always seemed to happen when the weather had suddenly become colder. I am not sure if this was a dodgy power supply voltage or whether the room was slightly colder. But shifting the power cable connector around a bit seemed to fix the problem. Maybe the temperature caused a heat expansion size mismatch between the socket and the connector.

PC Mag

[qazwart]

The Acer Ferrari 1100 would be more attractive if its price ($1,860) wasn't higher than that of the more aesthetically pleasing Apple MacBook Air ($1,799)

Boy, that PC magazine is such a Mac fanboy site.

Re:at least it has a real video card unlike the $1

[Joe The Dragon]

also you are looking at a big ram hit when you are useing vista with on board video.

Re:at least it has a real video card unlike the $1

[Joe The Dragon]

The $1500 macbook black should have a real video card a NVIDIA® GeForceTM Go 8400M GS with 128MB DDR3 dedicated graphic memory or maybe 256 should work good.

Re:at least it has a real video card unlike the $1

[LordLucless]

http://www.oqo.com/intl/products/index.html

Re:at least it has a real video card unlike the $1

[Runefox]

Agreed on 1024x768 (for me, it's native or bust, but my card can't always handle that). Disagree with the 60fps bit. 30fps does me quite well as a lower limit for almost anything (hi, NTSC!), and even 15 is playable to an extent unless there's a shitton of action going on. Anything lower is, yes, a slideshow, but 30-59fps is not a slideshow. If it is, perhaps you should lay off the coffee and Red Bulls. :P

I could have told you that

[lowededwookie]

The company I work for are contracted by Acer to do the hardware support on their gear and every Acer we've worked on has been cheap hardware and poor design. Anyone buying Acer gets exactly what they deserve, dead machines and a laugh in the face.

Horrible design

[SpaghettiPattern]

I remain on the save side saying 90% Ferraris are designed gorgeously.

Apart from the fact the Acer does not seem to convince on performance and sense, why in the name of god would Ferrari put its name on this ugly piece of junk?

Re:Horrible design

[Oktober Sunset]

Take a look at their clothing line and you'll start to see the pattern.

Re:Horrible design

[mgblst]

Money!

Re:Horrible design

[cojsl]

"Apart from the fact the Acer does not seem to convince on performance and sense, why in the name of god would Ferrari put its name on this ugly piece of junk?" As always, follow the money. Acer is a major sponsor of the Ferrari F1 effort, which no doubt aided in negotiating the right to use the Ferrari brand on laptops. No idea why this particular machine got the nod, I doubt that Ferrari has any say in what machine gets the label.

Re:Horrible design

[jdanton1]

Ferrari's F1 team was/is sponsored by Acer (and AMD) I think this product line came out of that partnership.

Re:Horrible design

[ogminlo]

Ferrari outsources most of its road-going coachwork design work most of the time. Pininfarina has done all of the prettiest Ferrari road cars' body designs. It stands to reason that they "design" laptops with as much aplomb as they "design" luggage, neckties, and wristwatches.

PC MAG ?

[gearloos]

Since when does anything PC Mag has to say matter ? I mean, cmon these guys also are the ones spouting off about how great ver x.x of xxx software is and its nothing but a bunch of spy/adware....Smells like Bonzi Buddy. You can download it "virus free" (no mention of adware however) from the PC Mag website.

Re:at least it has a real video card unlike the $1

[Rob Simpson]

You're right, Linux users have a pretty strong reason to like Intel's integrated graphics solutions. The other 99.5% of the market, however, does not.

Eh, they do? Even the most ridiculously huge and expensive desktop replacement wouldn't run the latest games as well as a cheap self-built desktop. And that's assuming that 99.5% of the market consists of gamers, which is a pretty big assumption. So why trade portability for the added heat and expense of discrete graphics?

Re:This shouldn't be at all surprising

[SoupIsGoodFood_42]

I'm just shocked that Ferrari would even consider putting their brand to such an utter turd. How the hell did Acer manage to trick them into it? I just can't believe how much of a turd that thing is.

Re: Lenovo X61 HAHAHAHA

[Nightspirit]

I have a fujitsu t4220 tablet. With the extended battery and 4200 rpm hard drive it got about 7.5hrs of battery. I put in a 7200 rpm drive and now I get about 7.3 hours. Not much of a difference (and the slight difference there is may be because the of wear/tear on the battery over the past 6 months).

There's something worse than an Acer laptop

[exp(pi*sqrt(163))]

Acer technical support. They go beyond incompetent into the realms of evil.

Re: Lenovo X61 HAHAHAHA

[Anpheus]

Power consumption on modern hard drives has dropped over time, so if you switched the hard drive recently, you might be getting a benefit from improved efficiency or power management. On the other hand, if you had opted for the same hard disk when you bought your laptop, you might have noticed a more significant difference.

Re:at least it has a real video card unlike the $1

[mdwh2]

That includes a game like Morrowind, which even ran poorly on a discrete Geforce 5600 (which could only manage to run it at 800x600 with FPS a lowly 15-30 range).

A 5600? How old is that? How does that suggest a much more recent 8400 wouldn't be able to run it well?

I shudder to think how low you have to reduce details/draw distance and resolution to run Morrowind on your GMA 950 or the GPUs in those laptops.

Not at all, I run at max settings at 1024x768, though I miss a few features like reflections (probably due to older shader model, which isn't an issue on newer cards). And I know how well it works on a faster card, as I have an 8600GT in my desktop. But yes, I'd rather have something better than the GMA for playing games - which is why the NVIDIA laptops are preferred over the Mac.

If a game cannot achieve a minimum of 60fps at 1024x768 then it is thoroughly unplayable unless you like blocky slideshows.

For an FPS or other game where fast action is always needed, yes, but not for other types of games. Unless you think watching a TV is like a blocky slideshow.

Re:This shouldn't be at all surprising

[Grimbleton]

Ubuntu for me. Added a good half hour to battery life, to boot.

Might be a bit too big...

[Rob Simpson]

I don't have any pockets big enough to carry the eee, anyway. The Samsung Q1, while quite long, might be narrow enough to fit in a jacket pocket. There are some upcoming ones that might work, too... here is a list.

Re:This shouldn't be at all surprising

[johny42]

Have you ever seen an Acer fanboy?

Re:at least it has a real video card unlike the $1

[Z00L00K]

Maybe it's the HTC Shift you want? 800 grams...

Add a bluetooth headset and you are set.

Re:This shouldn't be at all surprising

[Basehart]

AMD sponsors the Ferrari Formula 1 cars but no sign of Acer on their 2008 entry. It's a mystery to me too.

Re:at least it has a real video card unlike the $1

[KDR_11k]

I don't think many productivity applications use shaders at all so we're most likely talking about games where lack of performance really kills the main goal, having fun.

Re:This shouldn't be at all surprising

[SoupIsGoodFood_42]

Perhaps they aren't as well engineered compared to German supercars. But to say they are junk -- or as junky as that laptop -- is simply an insult to the designers, engineers, and builders at Ferrari and everywhere else. There F1 cars seem to do well.

Besides... Anyone who thinks a Ferrari is overpriced yet a Porsche isn't, is probably a wanker who always wears sunglasses all the time (and not just auto-tinting glasses). They're both overpriced and therefore he probably isn't sensible. Sensible is a Volvo V40.

Acer 1000

[Kupfernigk]

In fact you can still buy, heavily discounted, the 1000. (Mind you the supplier I went to is down to their last 5). I did, because both the alternatives in the price band only came with Vista and there was no guarantee that XP drivers were available for everything.

As for the toughness or otherwise of Acer laptops, just as with the Mac it depends on the range. We still have a 4+ year old 1501 which has been so heavily abused that numerous keys have lost part of their labelling, yet everything still works and, placed side by side with a Compaq equivalent, similarly used and a year newer, the Acer looks in much better condition. Admittedly it is on its second hard drive but, having been used for two years as a development test web server and database engine, it has an excuse.

The 1000, at its discounted price, is OK. It will happily run a presentation for 4 hours on the 6 cell battery. It doesn't get as hot as you would expect when both processors are churning away near 100%. The 5400rpm drive is adequate and the bundled utilities are pretty good. The absence of a built in DVD drive is no great sweat under office conditions; but then I use the thing for work. The carbon fibre layer in the case is possibly a bit silly, the badging is ludicrous, though possibly no sillier than calling clothes Diesel, but I have an XP laptop with dual CPU and 4G of RAM which should be still perfectly usable for all on the road needs and is warranted until Jan 2011.

To have bought the Macbook Air I would have had to have spent a great deal more money - including buying an Apple backup device and an external DVD drive - a lot more money to get the same warranty, and still not been able to buy a cheap second 6 cell battery to give me a total 8 hour operational life.

Re:at least it has a real video card unlike the $1

[TheThiefMaster]

That includes a game like Morrowind, which even ran poorly on a discrete Geforce 5600 (which could only manage to run it at 800x600 with FPS a lowly 15-30 range). To be fair, everything ran poorly on the nvidia 5000 series, due to it claiming shader support, despite being very bad at them.
"Homeworld 2" particularly sticks in my mind for this, it actually ran worse (unplayable) on the 5600 than on the geforce 2 I was trying to replace.

If a game cannot achieve a minimum of 60fps at 1024x768 then it is thoroughly unplayable unless you like blocky slideshows. Tell that to console gamers, most console games are played on 640x480 60Hz interlaced, with the framerate capped at 30 fps.
45 fps is considered the minimum for twitch games, eg action shooters like UT.
30 fps is the desired framerate for most other games.
10 fps is acceptable in real-time strategy games.

Depends on config

[Kupfernigk]

This does not make any kind of sense. The screen uses much more power than the HDD, so the idea that consumption of the whole laptop would more than double is frankly bizarre.

What is critical is the drive settings. If the new drive doesn't shut down properly on request you will use more power.

Actually, switching to a fast drive can often save power. This is because the faster drive is active for shorter periods when reading and writing to the disk. If you use a 4200rpm drive to copy large files, other things being equal it will take 60% longer than a 7200 drive. If (as I have found) the 7200 drive uses about 20% more power when active and about the same when idle, you can easily see where the saving comes from.

Re:This shouldn't be at all surprising

[Nimey]

Yes.

But it's a Ferrari!

[dangitman]

It's red! And goes... fast... it's sexy... and stuff. Isn't it?

Re:This shouldn't be at all surprising

[CastrTroy]

Same for me. Added half an hour of battery life, and probably an hour of actual working time, since I'm not waiting around for Vista to do whatever it is Vista spends all it's time doing. Even with all the stuff they added, I'm still not sure how they made it so slow.

Martin McFlyer? Is that you?

[freaker_TuC]

These days they got plug and pray, the added step for a close religion ;)

Re:We're no strangers to love

[Nikker]

Does this mean I was just Rick Rolled?

oh, it's Marty Mcfly

[freaker_TuC]

I guess I've needed to do some research before posting, that happens when you're mouse-rsi-trigger happy..

Re:at least it has a real video card unlike the $1

[mdwh2]

Nvidia measures performance with the second digit in the card's model. 5600 is 5th generation, 8400 is 8th generation, however since the "600" is higher than the "400", the 5600 is the faster card.

Benchmarks? Just because it's true that the 8600 was similar to the 7600 doesn't mean it's true that all x600 are the same, or that a card with a second higher digit will always outperfom a later generation card with lower digit. Are you seriously suggesting that in all the years since the first NVIDIA chipsets, they haven't improved in performance? That a 4600 will outperform an 8500? Sorry, that's ludicrous.

http://www.tomshardware.com/2005/07/05/vga_charts_vii/page4.html#3d_mark_2005 shows how even a 6600 demolishes the FX 5700, let alone a 5600. Then check out http://www23.tomshardware.com/graphics_2007.html?modelx=33&model1=716&model2=722&chart=308 to see the jump from a 6600 to a 7600 (about another factor of 2).

The GMA 950 may not have hardware T&L, but it does support pixel shader 2.0, which should be all Morrowind needs. In any case, I can't imagine that you get very good performance out of that IGP since the Geforce 6150 IGPs in one of my laptops can't even run Morrowind at an acceptable speed. What's your average, 10-15fps tops? Have fun with that...

It gets 100FPS indoors. On large outdoor scenes it drops to about 20-30FPS, but as others have said, that's more than adequate for a roleplaying game, not a fast shooter. So yes, I do have fun with that. And as I said, I know what it's like on a faster card anyway.

I've no idea why the lack of reflections - if it isn't shader model, it may be some other missing feature (unfortunately the Intel chipsets lack a lot - another reason to prefer the NVIDIA laptops).

Not everyone is a gamer interested in the latest games, games where high frame rates are needed and so on - but we still might play an occasional old game.

But not something as old as the GeForce FX 5600.

I don't know if you had a bad experience on that card or what, but seriously - the graphics industry has moved on light years since then.

Re:sunglasses = GAY

[SoupIsGoodFood_42]

Actually, they can help prevent deterioration of your eyesight including more serious eye conditions that can leave you blind. I'd liked to keep my eyesight as top-notch as possible. My glasses also have a special coating which reduces reflections and makes it easier for other people to see my eyes -- even when tinted.

Next time, please don't use "too chickenshit" when posting as an Anonymous Coward KTHX.

Re:SO? What's yer damn point...??

[bratwiz]

morons. confusing opposing opinion for flamebait.